Jutting up from the southern border of Kansas is a rugged region
known as the Chautauqua Hills. In a band approximately 10 miles wide,
these sandstone-capped hills extend as far north as Yates Center in
Woodson County. The sandstones in the Chautauqua Hills are the Tonganoxie
Sandstone Member of the Stranger Formation and Ireland Sandstone Member
of the Lawrence Formation. Locally known as the Chautauqua sandstone,
both are thick units, the remains of deposits that filled a large river
valley during the Pennsylvanian Period, about 300 million years ago.
A good place to see typical Chautauqua Hills sandstones is at The Hollow,
a city park in Sedan located a block east of downtown. At the park’s
entrance is a display of limestone from Chautauqua County containing
numerous fossils of rugose coral, which lived at the bottom of shallow
seas during the Pennsylvanian Period.

The mission of the Kansas Geological Survey,
operated by the University of Kansas in connection with its research
and service program, is to conduct geological studies and research and
to collect, correlate, preserve, and disseminate information leading
to a better understanding of the geology of Kansas, with special emphasis
on natural resources of economic value, water quality and quantity,
and geologic hazards.

The Geology Extension program furthers
the mission of the KGS by developing materials, projects, and services
that communicate information about the geology of Kansas, the state's
earth resources, and the products of the Kansas Geological Survey to
the people of the state.